Uber and Ola are clearly not perfectly safe, and especially not at late night. Of course, the number of incidents in Uber and Ola are statistically very low - and probably far lower than the number of occasions when a Black & Yellow or Auto driver assaulted a passenger. So they have clearly served to improve the lives of people. And to Mr Narayan’s point - yes, they will need to raise prices and squeeze drivers but you surely don’t expect VCs to keep funding them forever without a return.

However, given the issues with these services, we do need to take practical steps to reduce risk. Some suggestions:

1) Our firm hires cars from Avis and insists that any woman employee leaving after 10 PM use the same. We get reports if an employee leaves using an Ola or Uber instead.
2) Every firm may not be so willing to spend - so if you work for a not so employee friendly firm, do try and talk to someone while in the car - and let them know where you are - it at least reduces the risk.
3) Both the Apps have tracking features - enable that, and casually mention in your conversation that has been done.
4) Am skeptical about the value of Mace etc / some of these guys are outright thugs and could be violent if provoked.

It is such a sorry state of affairs that a woman is required to prepare herself differently than a man for a thing as trivial as commuting. The fear of something untoward happening is always at the back of her mind, and that thought just makes me sad.

I believe all cabs, Uber/Ola or otherwise should have two mandatory requirements before enrolling into service

Plexiglass partition between the front and rear of the cab

No central locking mechanism allowed

Apart from this, Google already has a new safety feature wherein if the driver deviates from the intended route, the user is alerted. Maybe send an alert to the cab aggregators as well?

And this would ensure basic safety for anyone, man or woman.
One could basically block unwanted access to the back seats with these two features.

A safe society is where women can feel safe and venture out at any time of day or night independently. Any other system or society is unsafe for all (including men).

Large proportion of victims of armed robbery are men. Security will not happen unless we stop viewing through the prism of gender.

In general (for any gender or age) if one is travelling in confined space where unknown individual is present, i recommend following
1. Share the details of vehicle, driver (name and photo), location and route with family members.
2. If possible share live location.
3. When boarding, pleas ask or wait for the driver to open door from inside. This is to ensure child lock will not prevent opening of door when needed to take evasive action.
4. At all times keep the audio recording ON (so never board with low battery and keep some kind of power bank if needed).
5. Carry some kind of chilli/pepper spray.
6. If there are more than 2 aggressors, running for life is safer.
7. Always carry small sharp object that can come handy to inflict injury in eyes or other such organs.

On the other hand, i have seen public transport also to be unsafe in many cases. Many years back i was advised to avoid certain Mumbai (it was called Bombay then) local stations late in night for risk of robbery.
But in general public transport in themselves are much safer compared to "private ride".

Some people were mentioning auto as another option, in Bangalore this is true based on locality. There are many areas i would not get within 50 meter radius of an auto, i have too many experiences with them.

In all fairness while this was an Ola driver the booking was not made through Ola. Nevertheless it is indicative of the people they hire as 'vendors'. The friendly neighbourhood Sardarji taxi group so common in Delhi-NCR in years recently gone by used to be much safer because they knew they had to live within that neighbourhood.

What happened to the Ola/Uber women cabs, driven only by women? It will be safer to use this facility during night times.

When its not safe for women to be in cabs during night times, is it safe to be as a driver?
And there is no option to choose lady driver while booking.
Here the case is not about women in cabs as customer or a driver, its the behavior of people with women when they are alone.